industrial

Etymology

From French industriel

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɪnˈdʌstɹɪəl/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Adjective

industrial (comparative more industrial, superlative most industrial)

1. Of or relating to industry, notably manufacturing.
   • 2013 June 29, “Unspontaneous combustion”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8842, page 29:

     Since the mid-1980s, when Indonesia first began to clear its bountiful forests on an industrial scale in favour of lucrative palm-oil plantations, “haze” has become an almost annual occurrence in South-East Asia. The cheapest way to clear logged woodland is to burn it, producing an acrid cloud of foul white smoke that, carried by the wind, can cover hundreds, or even thousands, of square miles.

   The industrial segment of the economy has seen troubles lately.

2. Produced by such industry.

   Handicraft is less standardized then industrial products, hence less artistic or rather flawless.

3. Used by such industry.
   • 2006, Edwin Black, chapter 2, in Internal Combustion‎:

     More than a mere source of Promethean sustenance to thwart the cold and cook one's meat, wood was quite simply mankind's first industrial and manufacturing fuel.

4. Suitable for use in such industry; industrial-grade.

   This is an industrial product—it's much too strong for home use.

5. Massive in scale or quantity.
6. Employed as manpower by such industry.
   • 1913, “There Is Power in a Union”, in Little Red Songbook, performed by Joe Hill:

     Come, all ye workers, from every land, / Come, join in the grand industrial band; / Then we our share of this earth shall demand.

7. (of a society or country) Having many industries; industrialized.
   • 2013 July 20, “Old soldiers?”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8845:

     Whether modern, industrial man is less or more warlike than his hunter-gatherer ancestors is impossible to determine. The machine gun is so much more lethal than the bow and arrow that comparisons are meaningless.

   Italy is a part-industrial, part-rural nation.

8. (music) Belonging or pertaining to the genre of industrial music.

   a track with clashing industrial beats

Noun

industrial (countable and uncountable, plural industrials)

1. (dated, 19th-mid 20th century) An employee in industry
2. (business) An enterprise producing tangible goods or providing certain services to industrial companies.
3. (finance) A bond or stock issued by such company
4. (informal, uncountable) industrial music

   I wish they'd play more industrial in this club.

5. (informal) An industrial piercing.

Anagrams

• diurnalist

Adjective

industrial (masculine and feminine plural industrials)

1. industrial

Etymology

Indústria (“industry”) +‎ -al

Pronunciation

• (Portugal) IPA^(key): /ĩ.duʃ.ˈtɾjaɫ/
• Hyphenation: in‧dus‧tri‧al

Adjective

industrial m, f (plural industriais, comparable)

1. industrial

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /indusˈtɾjal/, [ĩn̪d̪usˈt̪ɾjal]

Adjective

industrial (plural industriales)

1. industrial

Further reading

• “industrial” in Diccionario de la lengua española, Vigésima tercera edición, Real Academia Española, 2014.